The broader roundtable segments weren’t much more diverse: 62 percent of partisan-affiliated guests were Republican. More broadly, guests classified as either Republican or conservative far outnumbered Democrats or progressives, 282 to 164. The roundtables were 71 percent male and 85 percent white.

U.S. government sources — current officials, former lawmakers, political candidates, party-affiliated political operatives and campaign advisers — dominated the Sunday shows overall (47 percent of appearances). Following closely behind were journalists (43 percent), most of whom were middle-of-the-road Beltway political reporters.

Media Matters tallied the guest lists in 2005 and 2006 and came up with very similar results. There are never labor leaders, scientists, academics, activists or public policy experts on these shows, ever. There are scarcely any women or people of color. The Sunday shows are broadcast live from the cocoon.

When you imagine how many millions of people congratulate themselves for not getting all of their information from FoxNews, because they get a big chunk of it from Dancing Dave, et al, you start to understand how an asylum run by the inmates still gets to call itself one of our two major parties.